From the Books Thursday: Stuffed Mushrooms

This week is Playoff week on my blog because the Packers are playing the 49ers on Saturday at 6:30 CST.  If you are looking for a good appetizer for your party, get-together, or game watching that is easy to whip up and can be eaten with your fingers, here is one for you!

As a child, I despised mushrooms and thought they were the grossest fungus ever! Fresh or sauteed, I couldn't stand the texture. It was either too slimy or too spongy and grossed me out.

Now, I can't seem to get enough of them. My friends are 50/50 about them and my boss is even horribly allergic. I think I'll keep my low tolerance to Vitamin C over a complete allergy to a food. You never know what those could end up in!

Anyways, my mom suggested that we make stuffed mushrooms to go alongside the Ribs on a Stick from Robert's Specialty Meats, that we cooked up a few weeks ago. We just needed a recipe for proportions as we had our own ideas for the filling. We found one in the Pillsbury Annual Recipes of 2011 cookbook, but online, you find it on BetterCrocker.com.

I didn't realize that I only had one container of mushrooms when I mixed up the stuffing, so we had tons extra with nothing else for them to go on. 

Mom taught me how to easily de-stem the mushrooms with a quick twist and pull. We chopped this up to add to the filling. 

I mixed up Panko breadcrumbs, shredded Swiss cheese, chopped mushroom stems, green onions and chopped pecans.  

Stuffing them wasn't as easy as I thought because there was nothing to glue it together and have it stick in the mushroom - more of a balancing act. 

We popped them in a 9 X 9 cake pan and into the oven for 20 minutes at 350 degrees. (we waited to see the cheese get gooey and the mushrooms cook down just a little.)

The finished product: Stuffed Mushrooms

We served them immediately and I had 5 of the 9 I liked them so much. My mom thought they were dry and possibly blames the breadcrumbs. I'm am thinking some oil or pan would help glue it together, but I will definitely make them again.